2018 WPT Borgata Poker Open Main Event Day 3: TK Miles Open Up Wide Lead as Money Bubble Approaches

It was on to Day 2 of the World Poker Tour (WPT) Borgata Poker Open Main Event on Tuesday as the 490 survivors from the two starting flights came together to continue their advance to the money. Just 142 remain after Day 2 with TK Miles leading the way, bagging 1.062 million chips at night’s end.

Registration for the tournament did not close until the end of Level 10, two levels into Tuesday’s action. As a result, the total field swelled from 917 to 1,075, creating a prize pool of $3,441,075, easily beating the $3 million guarantee. 135 players will make the money; $6,097 will be the min cash and the winner will cash for $575,112. Clearly, the opening minutes of Day 3 will be tense as just a handful of eliminations are needed for the money bubble to burst.

In fact, the pressure-packed beginning to Day 3 was created by a late schedule change on Tuesday. The original play was to play through eight levels, ending at the close of Level 16. But because the money bubble was approaching, tournament management didn’t want the bubble to burst right at the end of the night, so it was decided that play would stop with 144 players remaining.* Obviously, that line was crossed slightly, but the end result was the same: those with short stacks will have to sweat it out overnight.

Miles is the only player in the tourney after Day 2 with more than a million chips. He is also the only player over 900,000 and 800,000. Nobody else has more than a quarter million chips. In fact, only eight players besides Miles have eclipsed the 600,000 chip mark. Needless to say, he is doing quite well.

This is nothing new for TK Miles, as he has more than $2.8 million in live tournament cashes in his career. Interestingly, even with that lofty sum, there isn’t one, single mind-blowing score on his resume. Not to say that more than $295,000 from winning the championship event of the 2014 Seminole Hard Rock Tampa Summer Poker Open isn’t money that could, say, pay off my house and leave me with more than $100,000 left over, but hey, I’m just making an observation.

*I don’t know exactly why this is, but I am guessing that it has to do with simply wanting everybody to be able to retire for the night. Allowing the money bubble to burst so close to the end of the night means that hand-for-hand play will have to take effect, which slows things down (though of course, the end of Level 16 could be reached). Possibly more importantly, it means a bunch of the staff will have to hang around to process cashouts.